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The 1985 torture and slaying of DEA agent Enrique “Kiki” Camarena marked a low point for U.S. Mexico-relations. It seemed to epitomize the dysfunction plaguing Mexico's rule of law under the Institutional Revolutionary Party, PRI.

But Rafael Caro Quintero, the founder of a Guadalajara drug cartel, was apprehended and convicted for ordering the killing. And PRI, which ruled Mexico pretty much as a one-party dictatorship for 70 years and was said to have been cozy with the cartels in its day, was swept from power 15 years later.

It's back.

And less than a year into its return, Caro Quintero is free, released in the 28th year of his 40-year sentence by a regional court. Camarena was not a diplomat, the court said, so Caro Quintero should have been tried in state court, not federal.

The independence of each of Mexico's branches of government — including the judiciary — is said to have been strengthened through the years. And, still, there is the whiff of corruption — or ineptitude, at best — in this release.

We've heard no explanation why Caro Quintero should not have remained in custody to be tried in state court in Jalisco. Nor is it anywhere near clear why, knowing that Caro Quintero was wanted on charges in the United States, he would not have been held for extradition. He walked free.

The release occurs after the PRI presidency of Enrique Peña Nieto said it is re-evaluating U.S.-Mexico cooperation on the drug war.

The PRI and Peña Nieto are in power today partly because Mexicans grew weary of the death toll from his predecessor's war on the cartels. President Felipe Calderón of the National Action Party involved the Mexican military more forcefully and was more welcoming of U.S. aid.

Fine — this strategy deserves a rethinking. Knocking off kingpins arguably resulted in deadly turf struggles for leadership and territory that exacted a heavy price on Mexicans. And if Mexico wants to eschew U.S. aid to stand more on its own, this is its sovereign right.

But releasing Caro Quintero — and threatening the release of two others convicted in the Camarena case — is not progress and advances the interest of Mexican sovereignty only if an unwarranted poke in the eye of a neighbor does so.

Mexican suspicion of the United States — and vice versa — is as old as the two nations. But if ever there was an issue on which those differences should be bridged, the drug cartels are it. Allowed to act with impunity in Mexico, they threaten that nation's security. And the product they sell ruins lives on both sides of the border.

Allowing a torturer and murderer to go free sets back hopes Mexicans had that this new presidency would usher in a new age. The only interest advanced here is that of thuggery and transnational organized crime.